


you'll be someone you wouldn't understand

by lieyuu



Series: a softer world [ i ship dream smp and happiness ] [4]
Category: Dream SMP (Video Blogging RPF), Video Blogging RPF
Genre: Canon Compliant, Character Study, Dream SMP: The Exile Arc, Gen, Introspection, M/M, Minor Clay | Dream/GeorgeNotFound (Video Blogging RPF), Realistic Minecraft, Relationship Study, Toby Smith | Tubbo Misses TommyInnit, Toby Smith | Tubbo-centric, TommyInnit (Video Blogging RPF) Is Exiled, haha dream-tubbo parallels go brrr, i also made up tje exile arc one but i think we as a community should start using tags like that, thats not a tag either i made that up, thats not a tag? whats the tag wtf
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-05
Updated: 2020-12-05
Packaged: 2021-03-09 21:28:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,066
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27893080
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lieyuu/pseuds/lieyuu
Summary: [ when we die, we come back different. like, with greener eyes, or as some far off star. ]There’s nothing quite like losing a best friend. There’s really nothing quite like watching him walk away from the home you built together, an axe that will swing at your command held like Damocles’s sword over his stuttering heart.
Relationships: Toby Smith | Tubbo & TommyInnit
Series: a softer world [ i ship dream smp and happiness ] [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2042497
Comments: 20
Kudos: 92





	you'll be someone you wouldn't understand

**Author's Note:**

> speedrunning tubbo fic at one am? its more likely than u think. anyways tubbo was right i said what i said BUT that doesn't mean he's not allowed to be a leetol sad about it
> 
> archive locked for a reason; do not send this fic to the content creators, recommend it to the content creators, or otherwise make them aware of it. thank you for respecting both my and their boundaries.
> 
> title and part of the summary taken from [this](https://asofterworld.com/index.php?id=62) chapter of _a softer world_

There’s nothing quite like losing a best friend. There’s really nothing quite like watching him walk away from the home you built together, an axe that will swing at your command held like Damocles’s sword over his stuttering heart.

Tubbo watches Tommy leave. It’s for the best.  _ For the best  _ does not make it hurt any less. He thinks he might see the shadow of a yellow sweater following, at a distance, as it’s recently taken to doing. He’s not surprised; he’s happy, even. At least Tommy will have a friend out there.

Fundy must see it too, because he scowls suddenly, and makes a sort of fox keening before muttering something about flamingos and Eret and taking off into the distance, in a direction that does not lead to Eret. Tubbo watches him go, too; exhaustion is a family friend, at this point, and as usual, she shows up unannounced.

Quackity stays. He doesn’t say anything, for a long moment. 

“Are you here to accuse me of being like Schlatt again?” Tubbo asks quietly, freshly eighteen and the president of a nation that has known nothing but war since her birth.  _ He _ has known nothing but war since his birth.  _ We’re one and the same, girl,  _ he thinks, and holds back a laugh when the obsidian doesn’t rumble beneath his feet.

(It would’ve for Tommy. L’Manburg is  _ his,  _ by blood and sweat and birthright. She speaks to him, and she speaks to Wilbur, and she does not speak to Tubbo.)

“No,” Quackity says, suspiciously quiet.  _ Maybe he’s realized comparing me to the man who made me plan my own execution isn’t the kindest,  _ Tubbo muses. Far-fetched, but he likes imagining. He eyes Quackity over the edge of the helmet he holds, and isn’t surprised when he just turns and walks away. 

He sits down on the edge of the obsidian, lets his legs hang over it. It’s warm in the way only the lava-made kind is - speaks volumes about the effort Dream put into building this. Young god, they call him, but blocking up L’Manburg was all mortal.

Mortal hands, pouring water over liquid fire. Mining it with a pickaxe, stacked and solidified to make the walls. All for a best friend he’s gone and destroyed anyways.

“At least I’m not going to get drunk on power and fall in love with him,” Tubbo says out loud, snorting. He could never be Dream - Dream is volatile and in love. Two things Tubbo very much is not. 

But he did destroy his best friend. They do have that in common. 

In the morning, Dream will report back, all netherite armor and white-faced smiles. He’ll say, “I took him to the coast. Told Ghostbur he was just taking a vacation.” Turn, pause, look back. “You did the right thing, Tubbo.”

And Tubbo, he’ll respond, “Yes, I did. I know.” He won’t ask  _ why doesn’t it feel like I did?  _ because Dream is still the enemy, a manipulative  _ bastard  _ who can’t be trusted, but he will hear it anyways. He will smile, kinda chuckle. 

“The things we do for God and country, hmm?”

_ Pro Deo et patria.  _ Tubbo will recognize the term. He studied Latin briefly, as a preteen and teenager. It had all kind of gone out the window when the second set of wars broke out, but he will remember some of it. 

“ _ Pro aris et focis, _ ” he’ll shoot back, with pronunciation he  _ knows  _ is flawed.  _ For hearth and home,  _ an ideal he has long since abandoned. “Shut up. Go away, Dream. Run back to George, or whatever. It’s Eret now, isn’t it. What, George wasn’t  _ obedient  _ enough for you?”

Dream will still, dangerously. “Watch your tone, Tubbo,” he’ll say, voice low and quiet. Dream is hardly ever quiet - white flags and empty threats attest to that. “Don’t you know your place?”

Young god, they call him. Tubbo has done plenty of blaspheming in his lifetime. Once more shouldn’t hurt.

“Sure,” he’ll say petulantly, crossing his arms and kicking his legs against the obsidian, because he hasn’t moved all night. “I know my place. I am president of L’Manburg, and I just had our greatest enemy personally escort my best friend out of the country he built. I know my place very well, Dream. Do you know yours?”

At this, Dream’s face will twist into something sharp and dangerous. Tubbo will reflect on how even Hades was a god; he won’t regret saying it. Dream will laugh sharply like he’s saying  _ watch your back,  _ and then he will walk away, bloody axe dragging on the ground.

Tubbo will wonder where the blood came from, wonder if it’s Tommy’s. He will find he’s too tired to care. Then he will push himself off the wall - his muscles have almost frozen, set themselves into the shape of the stone - and turn and walk away, towards the cabinet that disrespects him and the country that doesn’t speak to him. He will be president, and he will be  _ good.  _

This is all in the morning, though. For now, Tubbo sits on the wall, body not yet used to its edges and intricacies. He thinks on Tommy and disrespect, selfishness, blatant disregard for everything in life. The discs that mean nothing without the sentiment behind them. The sentiment that means nothing without the best friendship. The best friendship that means nothing, because it no longer exists. 

“Like brother like brother,” Tubbo says aloud to the empty air. He can still see Tommy, in the distance - he imagines he turns around, and laughs and nods in his Tommy way, says  _ see you around, Big T.  _

He doesn’t. He continues on, without a glance back. This is Tubbo’s fault. It does hurt, just a little. “At least the abandoning is mutual,” he lies to the tumbleweeds. 

The fact of the matter is: Tubbo must do what is best for L’Manburg. Tommy is a drug dealer, and a liar, and a thief. He is everything Tubbo is not, could never be - disrespectful, selfish, all the nasty words one calls a child. He will  _ ruin  _ this country.

Likewise, Tubbo is everything Tommy is not, could never be - president, leader, someone who will choose the greater good every time. He knows the right decisions, says the right words. Anything to keep the country safe.

Exiling Tommy is what’s best for L’Manburg. Tubbo desperately wants him back. 

**Author's Note:**

> *me posting this voice* im writing sad tubbo fic but actually rapunzel singing "and with every passing hour im so GLAD i left my tower like all you lovely folks ive got a dream" is running on loop in my head
> 
> stay safe everyone <3 comments and kudos much appreciated!


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